


hide away like an ocean

by shinealightonme



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alternate Universe- No Supernatural, M/M, Minor Richard Gansey III/Blue Sargent, Morning After
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-06
Updated: 2018-10-06
Packaged: 2019-07-25 22:16:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16206764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinealightonme/pseuds/shinealightonme
Summary: "It was a rhetorical question. Not what did I do but why on earth did I think it was a good idea."





	hide away like an ocean

**Author's Note:**

> Written for slightestcomplication on tumblr who prompted Adam, "This is very cliché."

Adam wakes up in a hotel room.

Which, he'd done that yesterday, so it isn't until he stretches out in bed and bumps into something soft and warm and _living_ that he remembers, _hang on, my room wasn't a suite._

That wakes him up the rest of the way, and he sits up and jerks his head over to see Gansey's friend Ronan asleep next to him.

"Oh, Parrish," Adam whispers, "what did you do last night?"

Ronan is curled on his side facing away from him -- _at least we weren't spooning_ , Adam thinks, hysterical and unhelpful -- but he can tell that his eyes are still shut when he asks, "you don't remember?"

"Fuck!" Adam jumps at the discovery that Ronan is, after all, awake.

"Oh, you do remember." Ronan sits up in bed. He doesn't come off at all sluggish, which is completely unfair; Adam isn't going to be himself for another half an hour or two cups of coffee, whichever comes first. "You said you weren't drunk." It's an accusation.

"I wasn't," Adam snaps. "It was a rhetorical question. Not what did I do but why on earth did I think it was a good idea."

Ronan scowls at him. "If you're going to gay panic at me I'm going to kick you out."

"I went through my bi panic when I was seventeen, thanks."

"So what's the problem?" Ronan stretches. Adam's eyes are drawn to his abs and their six-pack reminder of why on earth he had thought this was a good idea.

"It's embarrassing."

Ronan's scowl intensifies, like getting kicked out of the hotel suite is once again an immediate possibility. It occurs to Adam that he's being ruder than he needs to be to a guy who, when you get right down to it, hadn't done anything worse to Adam than get him off. A few times.

"Just -- " Adam waves a hand, at a loss to explain the self-reproach he's feeling. Given how familiar he is with self-reproach, he ought to be better at this by now. "This is such a cliché."

"What, having gay sex in a B&B in Vermont?"

"No. Probably," Adam amends. "I meant sleeping with the best man at a wedding."

"You do that a lot?"

"No," Adam says, increasingly exasperated. He has a feeling that Ronan is misunderstanding him on purpose. It doesn't make him feel any better about explaining himself. "But it's -- a thing. Haven't you ever been to a wedding?"

"Sure. I was a groomsman for my brother last year at Our Lady of Angels. I didn't have a compulsion to fuck his best man."

 _His best man must not have looked like you,_ but at least in a morning of indignities he manages not to say that out loud.

There's no graceful way to cover yourself while getting out of bed naked, so Adam doesn't bother trying, just stands up and collects his clothes in a steady, calm way to hide his nerves. It's not like this is the first one-night stand he's had, but everything feels extra weird today. His college roommate got _married_ , and that still hasn't processed: Gansey, _Dick Gansey the Third_ , Richard "help I tried to ask a girl out and accidentally implied she was a prostitute" Gansey had gotten _married_.

Adam had watched the whole courtship from a distance through texts and Facebook posts and Skype calls, from accusations-of-sex-work to somehow-we're-dating-no-I-don't-get-it-either to wait-giving-your-girlfriend-a-tree-instead-of-an-engagement-ring-worked? All of it had felt like an appropriately sized deal at the time, important events in someone else's life, and then somehow he'd been at a _wedding_. His oldest friend was creating a new family, was going to build a home and a life with someone, and meanwhile Adam had -- what? A condo he'd hired someone else to decorate because his infrequent guests all told him it was depressing? Twenty hours of overtime a week? A string of brief flings and hookups that had left him with no one he cared about enough, no one who cared about him enough, to be his plus one at a destination wedding where he hadn't known anyone except the bride and groom.

And then to top it off he'd spent the night in the best man's hotel room, which was pure _lonely single person_ cliché. No, worse: it was a _quarter-life crisis_. Fuck, he needed to get the hell out of Vermont and forget any of this ever happened.

His cell phone falls out of the pocket of his pants when he grabs them. He picks it up off the ground, sees that he missed a phone call and a text, both from Gansey. The _groom_. Fuck, that's still weird. "Gansey wants to have breakfast," he says, as much to himself as to Ronan.

"Aren't they supposed to be on their honeymoon?" Ronan gets up and looks over Adam's shoulder at his phone, though Adam would guess that one of the half-dozen unknown numbers in the group text is Ronan's. "Or passed out from all the boning."

"No one has sex on their wedding night anymore."

Ronan frowns at him, quizzical. "You have a lot of weird opinions about how people have sex."

"As opposed to Our Lady of Angels, who doesn't care at all," Adam says. It distracts him, momentarily, from the fact that Ronan is back in arm's reach and they're both very naked. He definitely needs to get out of here and start repressing. Except his room is the next floor up from Ronan's suite, and he feels a bit...obvious...to risk running into anyone on the stairs. "Can I use your shower?"

Ronan shrugs. Adam counts it as a yes.

Ronan's still scowling when Adam comes out of the bathroom, showered and clothed. He _knows_ that Ronan is capable of other expressions, of looking happy, even, but he wouldn't have known it based just off this morning.

He really has been ruder than the situation called for.

"I'm going to go," he says, and, more awkward with every word, "I had fun last night."

Ronan doesn't even look up. "Sure, whatever."

Okay. So much for being polite.

Adam goes back up to his room and takes his time getting ready for breakfast -- shave, comb his hair, put on fresh clothes. It lets him pull his mind together, outward composure leading to inward composure.

Okay. It's a cliché to have a one-night stand with the best man at a wedding. That means that other people do it, too, and if "other people do it" isn't a compelling reason to do something, it does at least indicate this won't kill him. Ronan isn't any of the things Adam has always wanted, any of the things that he thinks he's finally, painstakingly ready for. This isn't a serious relationship where he can be open and honest and still loved anyway, but it doesn't hurt anything, either. It's just a diversion from his real life, and once this weekend is over it isn't going to matter that he had some meaningless sex. Some fantastic, hot, all-night, meaningless sex.

He realizes that he's staring at a love bite in the mirror, still only half dressed, and swears.

By the time he gets down to the hotel restaurant, Ronan is already there. Adam hadn't taken _that_ long to get dressed. Had Ronan skipped taking a shower? That was gross, coming down to breakfast with last night's sweat on his skin, _Adam's_ sweat, under his clothes --

Adam shakes himself. _Stop thinking about Ronan's skin_.

"Adam!" Blue beams at him from the large round table currently hosting the remnants of the wedding party in various stages of hangover. She has most of last night's makeup on her face. If Adam had to put on that much eyeliner and mascara he would hate taking it off, too, but just _sleeping in it_ doesn't seem like much of a solution. The black smudges around her eyes make her look unfortunately like a brawler, or maybe that's the point. "Come over here, sit down."

The only seat at the table is the one on Ronan's left.

Adam takes it. At least that way he won't be looking at him.

"Did you guys meet Adam last night?" Gansey asks the table, though he's looking at Blue, because he's going to spend the next month doing nothing but looking at Blue with that goofy smile on his face. Which feels like a waste of an international vacation, but it's not like he can't afford a second honeymoon once he stops being shocked that he somehow conned his wife into marrying him.

The rest of the table replies in the negative. Adam is bad at small talk and mingling, and Gansey and Blue had been too busy getting married to shepherd him around the crowd. He'd ended up having a lot of boring but productive conversations with the guests in their parents' generation, because Jesus, Ganseys moved in powerful circles, but it hadn't exactly been fun.

Or not until he'd gone to get a seltzer water from the open bar and bumped into a guy who managed to make a tux look disreputable. And at that point he'd been a little too entranced to pay attention to the rest of the reception, or to his better judgment.

Adam lets Gansey introduce him to their friends, who mostly, like Gansey and Blue, live in San Francisco, which Adam has somehow never found the time to visit.

He doesn't flinch when Gansey ends the list of names with "Ronan Lynch," but it's close. Goddammit, Adam is not a dumb college kid anymore. He should really be at a place in his life where he learns someone's last name _before_ he has sex with them.

The conversation moves on. A gift to Adam: the wedding yesterday gives them all an obvious, easy focus. He doesn't have to exercise his limited small talk prowess, just nod in agreement whenever someone says something nice about the vows or the catering.

Ronan leans in front of him to grab the coffee pot that they must have talked the server into leaving on the table. He smells like hotel soap and caffeine. Maybe he did shower this morning. Or maybe he always smells amazing.

"Oh yeah," Ronan says. "Pretty romantic wedding for a guy who thinks mummies make good dates."

"I don't think I know that story," Adam says. "You should have put it in your toast."

The weird thing about group conversations: Ronan wasn't speaking to Adam, and Adam wasn't responding to him, but everyone is paying more attention to Blue's recitation of all of Gansey's misguided opinions on readings for the ceremony. So Adam ends up talking to Ronan alone, having a conversation, like they'd never seen each other naked.

"Sargent's aunts demanded veto power over my speech," Ronan grumbles. "I had to cut out all the best parts."

"What did you consider the best parts, exactly?"

"All the swearing." Ronan thinks. "Also the part about Gansey's students thinking his girlfriend was Canadian fake because who the fuck would be called _Blue_."

Adam grins. "And you let them call the shots like that?"

"Have you _met_ her aunts?" and okay, Ronan has a point there.

Their side conversation peters out. Adam doesn't know how he'd keep it going, or even if he wants it to. He tunes back in to the rest of the table. One of the Bay crew -- he digs for a name; Cheng, he's pretty sure -- is complaining about a lack of bouquet toss.

Blue's gaze is full of contempt. "If I'm going to throw something into a crowd of my friends, it's going to be something that does more damage than flowers."

"But now we will never know who is getting married next!" Cheng pulls some puppy dog eyes that have no place being directed at a woman one day into a marriage. Not that Adam's in a position to judge anyone's romantic pursuits.

"We will as soon as one of us gets married," someone points out.

Cheng sighs out a hurricane. "No, you have doomed us all. Now none of us shall ever wed."

"Aw," Blue says, too cutesy. "Sorry, Ronan."

"Whaddya mean, sorry _Ronan?_ " someone asks. "He's not even seeing anyone."

"Is it not obvious?" Cheng asks, and leaves no time for anyone to answer. "He wants so badly to be married and playing house. The rest of us are all lackadaisical pseudo-adults who are lucky to eat a home-cooked meal once a month, but Ronan is meant to be a husband."

Adam can't help looking at Ronan out of the corner of his eye. He looks like he doesn't care about what Cheng is saying. He looks, in fact, like he's putting a lot of work into looking like he doesn't care.

"Doesn't matter," Ronan says, "gays aren't into monogamy anymore." Adam bites down on a scone. The comment hits him like a slap. "Now that we can get married we all think commitment's passé."

Adam puts down the scone. That's definitely a slap. He hadn't meant to poke at Ronan's soft spots, especially not when it turns out that he has the same ones. He wants to apologize, for using Ronan for the night, for freaking out about using him for the night, for rubbing it in his face that that's all he ever intended.

But what good would that do? So what if Ronan wants something serious and Adam wants something serious. Neither of them is going to get it by putting any more work into a _one-night stand at a wedding_ , the very definition of trivial. Just get out of Vermont, Parrish, get home and find a matchmaker. Or a shrink.

The table has no concern for Adam's inner turmoil. Conversation moves on. One of Blue's friends resents being referred to as a lackadaisical pseudo-adult, but since her girlfriend is still sleeping off a hangover and she came to breakfast in her pajamas, everyone overrules her objections. The rest of the table comes out as single and proud of it.

"Seeing anyone, Adam?" Cheng asks, and wow, okay, those puppy dog eyes are indiscriminate.

Blue saves him. Sort of. "Adam can't date, his job would get jealous."

"My job and I have an understanding," Adam says dryly. "I'm allowed to date if I ever met someone, I'm just not allowed to meet anyone except the people I work with, and they're all married or very divorced."

"There are degrees of divorced?"

Adam nods solemnly. Cheng looks thoughtful.

Everyone else, unfortunately, takes this as some kind of problem-solving opportunity.

"Have you tried Bumble?"

"No, Coffee Meets Bagel is the best."

"Hey, Tinder's not that bad. You need to be where the most people are."

"No, no, Hinge! You gotta try Hinge."

"Uh." Adam has no idea how to handle this onslaught of advice. He hasn't even heard of half the names people are dropping. "I don't really like apps."

Gansey perks up. Of course he would; _a friend is in danger!_ They might as well shine a spotlight of an archaeologist into the night sky, whatever that would look like. "Maybe Ronan could help."

Adam stares.

 _How._ How does Gansey _know._ How does _Gansey_ know --

"What." Ronan sounds disturbed, so there goes the idea that Ronan told Gansey about last night.

But if he _didn't,_ then _how_ \--

"You've lived in DC longer than he has," Gansey continues, oblivious. "You should take Adam out sometime, show him the cool places to go. He never goes anywhere that isn't for work."

It dawns on Adam that Gansey does not know he and Ronan slept together, only that he thinks Ronan could help Adam meet people.

It dawns on him _very slowly_ , though, because it's so much less important than the other realization that is smacking him over the head, demanding his attention.

"You live in DC?" he asks Ronan.

Ronan, deeply distrustful, nods.

Adam blinks and then he scares the crap out of himself: He _smiles_.

He has to fight like hell to keep from smiling so hugely that the entire table would notice, but he can't possibly fight it off entirely.

"I didn't know that." Adam looks down at his coffee. "You should take me out sometime, yeah."

The conversation moves on again. Adam doesn't dare speak. Doesn't dare look at Ronan.

Under the table, Ronan's knee bumps into his.

Adam reaches out carefully with his foot. Slides it along the hotel carpet until it's resting up against Ronan's.

Breakfast winds up shortly after that. Everyone takes a minute to say goodbye to the married couple before they head out on their backpack honeymoon of South America.

Adam says goodbye to Gansey, magnanimously shelving his newfound grudge about Gansey never bothering to ever tell Adam that the hottest man in the world lives in the same city as him. He hugs Blue tight, murmurs in her ear, "no regrets?" and delights in the way that he can feel her laughing against him.

"Um, hello, you've _seen_ my husband, right?"

"I meant about camping in dirt for the next month," Adam says. "It's not too late to have a real vacation, you know."

"Get married yourself and you can do whatever the hell you want." She looks at him pointedly. He wonders for a paranoid second if _she_ somehow knows how he spent the night.

"I'm working on it," he says, and she kisses him on the cheek.

He takes a second to look over, but -- Ronan is talking to Gansey, several feet away from the rest of the group and intense. Adam has enough control to give him his chance for a goodbye.

He leaves the restaurant. He should go up to his room, anyway. He needs to pack and check in for his flight --

He stops in the middle of the lobby.

\-- his flight _back home_ , to DC, where Ronan lives too.

His feet start moving again, but they only take as far as a couch against the wall. He falls into it without a care for his travel timeline, drops his elbows on his knees.

It's not like this makes a difference. You can't ascribe meaning to something after the fact. It was still just a stupid, empty, cliché hookup.

A pair of black boots walks through his field of view, a second before a body sits down on the couch next to him.

"So," Ronan says, overly casual, "do you date people that live in the same city as you, or is that too mainstream? Because I don't want to offend you by asking you for your number if that's a _cliché_ \-- "

Adam turns around and kisses him.

"Liar," he says. Ronan looks like he's lost the entire thread of the conversation, which Adam takes as a compliment. He kisses him again once, quickly. "You absolutely want to offend me."

-

"You better not sleep with the best man at this wedding, too," Ronan says.

Gansey takes a break from crying, just long enough to say, "of course not!" before he goes back to his handkerchief.

"Shut up." Adam doesn't know which one of them he's talking to. Both. Both is good.

Ronan heeds him not at all. "Because that'd be very _cliché_." He tugs on Adam's tie like he's straightening it, except Adam knows it was straight already, and he knows that Ronan wouldn't bother to straighten it if it did need straightening. "Sleeping with my best friend, I mean, I could forgive the cheating, but I couldn't marry someone who was such a cliché."

Adam turns to Blue as the only sane person in the room. "Is it too late to call this off?"

Blue looks even less amused about the situation than Adam feels. She pulls an envelope out of the inner pocket of her suit jacket and makes a point of not breaking eye contact with Adam until she has to, to start reading. "Adam," she intones, voice flat. "This is you from the past. Blue is making you write this, because she thinks she's so clever. No matter what irritating thing Ronan does tomorrow you're not allowed to call off the wedding -- "

"I hate all of you," Adam tells them.

"Yeah," Ronan says. "But you hate me the most."

Adam sighs, because Ronan has him beat, and they both know it. "I'm going to add that to my vows," he warns, but Ronan just grins at him, like he's actually excited about it. What a weirdo. There is no one in the world like Ronan.

**Author's Note:**

> If you like this fic you can [reblog it on tumblr](http://toast-the-unknowing.tumblr.com/post/178797713070/okay-tumblr-ate-another-ask-while-i-was-trying-to)!


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